Senior receives American Mathematics Society award

Challis J. E. Kinnucan, a Bates College senior from London, Ontario, has been awarded a $4,000 scholarship grant from the American Mathematical Society’s Waldemar J. Trjitzinsky Fund. A math major formerly of Albuquerque, N.M., Kinnucan was awarded the scholarship in August. Trjitzinsky Fund awards are intended as an investment in the future of mathematics, helping to ensure that talented math students are financially able to complete their degrees.

“I feel honored that the math department elected me for this,” said Kinnucan.

She was selected because of her excellence in mathematics, her dedication and desire to further her study in the field, said Professor Peter Wong, chair of the Bates math department. In a statement issued by the AMS, Wong described Kinnucan as “one of the best mathematics students in recent years at Bates.”

Her accomplishments include a National Science Foundation-sponsored Research Experience for Undergraduates at East Tennessee State University, in Johnson City, during summer 2001. She presented the results of that research in a paper, “Lotteries and Poisson Approximation,” at the AMS-sponsored Joint Mathematics Meetings in San Diego last January.

In fall 2001, Kinnucan attended the Budapest Semester in Mathematics, taking a graduate-level course in abstract algebra during her time in Hungary.

Along with math, Kinnucan enjoys traveling and art, both making it and looking at it. In addition, as she told the AMS, “I also like working with children, whether it is teaching or just hanging out.”